Haven Haunt

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

I can't believe that I have not posted here all year. It has been a very busy year around the Haven Haunt. As many of you know my two nieces came to live with us last Sept. 1 and my life as I know it changed. When your baby is almost 30 and you are suddenly immersed in the day to day life of a 7 and 11 year old, it takes some adjustment.

The youngest remained with us until the end of January when she was granted the okay to go and live with her dad. The oldest is still with us and I am happy to announce that Audree will remain with us permanently, as my daughter was granted custody of her!!!!! Woo hoo!

Today is Sept. 1 and the anniversary date of her joining our family. The custody has been final for several weeks now, but today is a day of celebration here.

I have not totally neglected my Halloween planning all year and have been back in full planning mode all during August. I will be hosting three parties this year and things have been busy with the planning.

I am hosting my first all female witches Halloween party fashioned after parties of friends from the Halloween Forum site. Several posters there host a Witches Wingding and a Bewitched Bash. They have been doing this for several years and last year I read about it too late to plan one of my own. But, this year, I will debut my Be WITCHY party in mid-October.

WITCHY is an acronym for Wonderful Intelligent Talented Charming Helpful You. Be WITCHY will be a celebration of and for women, all dressed in their witchy finery. I will be writing more about the planning and decorating during the next two months on a regular basis. However, I wanted to drop by today and show off my newest witch prop.

This is not a very good photo of her, but she is adorable. She will greet guests as they come in the front door.

I spent last night working on the plans for the front yard and little courtyard area out front. More to come about this later.

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Welcome the first Boo Bash at the Haven Haunt. We had 30 guests and they stayed through the night with one group of relatives playing poker on the screened porch until 5:30 a.m. I guess that means the party was a success. It was a lot of work and I was busy with food right up until guest started arriving.

Photos of the actual Boo Bash are rather slim. I kept forgetting to take them! You will find some of various guests at the bottom of this LONG post. Some of the photos are out of order, but I tried to give a view of the party from the time you walked up the sidewalk to the front porch. Please forgive me for not being more organized in the photo department.

Again, thanks for stopping by and visiting the Haven Haunt 2009.

Left side of front porch area

Right side of front porch area

Hanging Screemer greeter and scarecrows in front porch area

Come in for a visit and some Halloween fun! Don't forget to stop by the skeleton hand door knocker on the back door to play Tempt Your Fate. Frightful entertainment will follow each haunting knock.

Wizard's spell book Our Glorious Ghoulish Century

Left side of entryway and washstand in Ye Olde Magick Shoppe

Ye Olde Magick Shoppe in entryway

Turn right in the Magick Shoppe to enter the door to witch's kitchen. Or, just proceed straight ahead into the living room called the Crossbones Inn. Watch out for the ghoul hanging on coat closet door before you enter the kitchen to be greated by all the witches.

The door to the left in the entryway takes you to the hallway Catacombs and two of the bedrooms. The front bedroom is the Haunted Hotel, featuring some scary and some not so scary guests. The hallway Catacombs features a mini graveyard on the corner shelf and many skeletons trying to escape their prisoned walls. Some have slipped through the bars and you can see their gravestones lining the hall.

Straight ahead from the entryway is the living room which is the Crossbones Inn this year. The fireplace seems to be housng a spider colony. Don't forget to check out the ghoulish busts on the mantle and the caged skeleton.

Sofa table with family gortraits gives you something to look at while resting. Be careful of eating the candy, some of the relatives died shortly after sneaking a handful of the candied corn.

Corner shelf with Halloween ceramics

Hanging ghouls in living room (this was before the deadly spiders came to visit us.

The dining area was the Pumpkinhead Diner complete with a painted sign from Dollar Tree. I love this Pumpkinhead guy. I bought it at Big Lot

Here is a photo of the Frightful Food buffet table. There was a lot of food and just a variety to choose from.

I love the wire spooky Halloween tree. I received it in a swap several years ago. I also used many containers that fit the spooky mood of the table and food.

I was in a hurry when I made the coffin for the Dead Man's Dip, but it came out okay. It is an unsliced loaf of pumpernickel bread with pretzel rods added for the handle. I scooped out most of the center of the bread and filled the hole with cream cheese and picante dip.

This Beware sign was suspended from the upper cabinet door above the stove.a

An array of witches that found a new home on my kitchen countertops for the Boo Bash.

Several of my witch signs are shown here with the large hanging witch suspended from the ceiling. You can see the crashed witch on the door to the garage in the background.

This is the pass through window from the kitchen to the living room. I love my pumpkin tea pot and the ceramic witch's shoe. You can also see one of my small brooms above the stove.

This witch is lighted and also has sound. She is called the rock n roll witch.
She sways to the eeirie music and dances.

Paper witch centerpiece that rested on top of the refrigerator.

This another of my favorites. She looks so regal sitting atop one of my canisters.

This adorable witch wreath decorates the door into the kitchen from the entryway. She even has a garlic pod to ward away the vampires this month.

Witch clings on the backsplash above the sink. The one on the right end of the cabinets is just a cheap vinyl mask.

Another one of the small broom props. What is a witch's kitchen without brooms?

The cute witch black cat and a stuffed cutesy witch found a new home atop the microwave cabinet.

Entrance to master bedroom, which is off the kitchen/dining area. Another Dollar Tree sign.

Master bedroom with boo light and ghost on the wall. Sheets were draped
over my square coffee table that we stored there for the party

Zombie guy that we made from pieces of a kids costume and a cheap mask with a baloon inside for form. He was hanging in front of a large dreamcatcher and we just left the feathers for the hands.

The zombie guy and a pillowcase ghost that the girls made to cover a floor lamp.

This hanging ghoul is another one made from a kid's costume top and a fabric mask with a ballon under it for form. The white material covered a fan and made another ghost.

Close-up of the hanging or flying ghoul.

Pillowcase ghost that covers my vaccum in the bedroom area.

Small ghost on bedroom door.

Ghost on wall above the kingsized bed.

Door to master bath Butcher's Shop---another Dollar Tree sign.

One of the clostet doors in master bath. Bloody butcher's coat hanging on the grab bar of the body parts tub.

Various body parts strewn across the vanity in bathroom Butcher's Shop.

Bloody mirror

Butcher's apron hanging on closet door.

Large creepy hand on top of body parts tub.

Body parts in tub.

Close-up of various mangled body parts.

More body parts

Sign to Bat Room bathroom

Hanging bats (see large bat on shower at right)

Bat room mirror and bat light, spider webs and bats

Flying bats and hanging large bat

Large hanging bat

Anti H1N1 Venon

Sign on door to hallway Catacombs

The hallway between the two bedrooms was made into a Catacombs area. We used the wall cling sheets from Dollar Tree to make it feel like you were walking through a dungeon. I placed small gravestones at the bottom of the wall sheets to fill the space to the floor. There were two different sheets that lined the short hallway.

Snoopy (Bob) and the Great Pumpkin (Kathy) and their granddaughter, Alison. This couple won one of the couple prizes.

I left this photo out and just came back to add it. This creepy door knocker was placed on the door to the screened porch with the sign explaining the Tempt Your Fate game. Everytime anyone was ready to play, they had to push the button on the door knocker. Everyone knew that the game was on and to watch or listen. If fate was kind to you, you received a prize and if fate was cruel to you, you had to perform one of the fates on the slips of paper drawn after knocking. Bad fates included singing various Halloween or spooky well known theme songs. I had the words printed up. Other bad fates included various dances like Thriller, Monster Mash, etc. or singing Halloween songs to the music of well known Christmas carols or songs. It was a lot of fun.

Prizes were small bottles of liquor, murder or mystery themed books, and lots and lots of horror movies. These were also the things used for costume contest prizes.

Alison wrapping David up as a Mummy.

Caden trying to mummify Audree during the Mummy game.

Alison being wrapped by the other kids.

David and Caden wrap Alison up as a Mummy in a Boo Bash game.

Duke trying to dance to the Monster Mash with the kids---or was it Thriller?????

About Me

I love the holidays and decorating for them. I have always been a Christmas nut and have enjoyed the fall and Halloween, but never to an extreme. This year, I decided to host our first Boo Bash, Halloween Cosume Party and have found a new love!
I named this blog Haven Haunt as a contridiction of the term haven, which is where the name of where I live. Since it is for Halloween, I decided on Haven Haunt.
I have been married for 36 years and have one adult daughter and one son, who is in Heaven. We have a Mini Pin dog, named Duke and a Daushund, who just crossed over the Rainbow Bridge this past summer.